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ADDEESSES 



DEATH or HON. T. H. HICKS, 



DELIVERED IN THE 



SENATE AND HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, 



IVEDIVESDAV, FEBRIJARV 15, 1865. 



U.S. 38TVj CorAfl. la Si;^'4. 

7^0^'^ 




WASHINGTON: 

GOVERNMENT PKINTINO OFFICE. 

18G5. 



831- 



•©1 



u m 



IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, 

Saturday, February 25, 1865. 

Resohcd, That five thousand copies of the eulogies on Senator HiCKS, 
delivered in the Senate and House of Representatives, be printed for the use of 
the members of this House. 



-m 



-res 



ADDRESSES 

ON THE 

DEATH OF HON. T. H. HICKS. 



IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES, 
Wednesday, February 15, l865. 



Address of Mr. Johnson, of Maryland, 

Mr. President : It is my painful duty to announce to 
the Senate the death of my late colleague and friend, 
Thomas Holliday Hicks. The sad event occurred at 
his lodgings in this city on Monday morning, the loth 
instant, at seven o'clock, A few days of indisposition, 
so apparently slight as to give his friends no uneasi- 
ness, was, without any seeming premonition, followed 
on the Friday before his death by a sudden attack of 
paralysis, so severe that its fatal result was at once seen 
to be inevitable and near at hand. It rendered him 
speechless, but did not so aifect his mind but that he 
recognized the friends around him, and by whom, to the 
last, he was carefully and affectionately attended, until 
within a few hours of his decease. Governor Hicks 
(a title by which he is best known and will be ever 
gratefully remembered, not only by Maryland but by 
the nation) was born in Dorchester county, Maryland, 
on the 2d of September, 1798. His parents were 
highly respectable, but with a large family and limited 



means they were unable to give their son a collegiate 
education. What he was taught was merely rudimental, 
and this was acquired in one of the common schools of 
the county. 

His father being a farmer, Governor Hicks assisted 
him in that occupation until his minority terminated, 
when he commenced a career of his own. With man- 
ners and disposition that were native to him, and well 
calculated to win esteem and confidence, he was at an 
early age made a constable of his county, an office 
humble but trustworthy, and discharged its duties so 
satisfactory that, in 1824, at the early age of twenty- 
six, he was elected its sheriff, an office of high grade 
and of much importance and responsibility. This 
office also he conducted with an intelligence and integ- 
rity that commanded general approval, and gave him 
even a stronger hold on the popular judgment. Its 
term expired, he engaged in mercantile business in 
Vienna, a village in his county, and in this position his 
diligence and integrity were again exhibited. In 1836 
he was elected a member of the electoral college which 
at that period appointed the senators of the State, and 
in the proceedings which ensued, and which for a time 
filled our citizens with solicitude, and attracted the 
attention of the whole country, he conducted himself 
with his accustomed discretion and firmness, and evinced 
his inherent love of law and order. He was at one time 
one of the governor's council, a station of the greatest 
trust and honor, and for several years was elected by 
the people of Dorchester a member of the house of 
delegates of the State; and on each occasion so dis- 

m 



HON. T. H. HICKS. 5 

charged his duties as to retain their confidence. In 
1838 he was appointed by the governor register of 
wills of the county, and when the office was made elective 
by the people he was twice elected to it, and would 
have been a third time if he had not declined it. In this 
official and important trust he again displayed business 
capacity and perfect integrity. In 1849 and 1850, by 
the choice of his uniformly confiding constituents, he 
was elected to the constitutional convention of the State, 
and discharged its duties faithfully and with ability. He 
was afterward chosen by popular vote governor of the 
State, and held that station when the present rebellion 
commenced and until 1862. 

It is his official conduct in that office that has made 
his name so well and favorably known to every loyal 
man in the Union. 

During this period his responsibility was such as to 
task his firmness and his judgment, and to test his 
patriotism. They proved equal to the emergency. 
With a people whose feelings, from their locality and 
sameness of habits and institutions, were so well calcu- 
lated to cause them to sympathize with our southern 
brethren, and who were sensitively alive to any inter- 
ference with that particular institution they had known 
and possessed from the colonization of the States, and 
in which their pecuniary means were largely invested, 
with business and social relations closely binding them 
to the south, it was not surprising that they should for 
a time forget the paramount duty which they owed to 
the general government, or be blind to the consequences 
that were sure to follow an attempt to dissolve the 




Union whicli that government created, and was wisely 
designed, and endowed with powers amply adequate, if 
properly exerted, to preserve forever. 

In this interval of temporary forgetfulness an excite- 
ment amounting to madness threatened the State with 
a fraternal war, and with driving her into the rebellion, 
that would have made her soil the battle-ground of the 
strife which has deluged every seceding State in blood, 
and would certainly have involved her in ruin. Against 
every effort that ignorance or ambition could essay to 
effect the insane and wicked purpose, Governor Hicks 
interposed the whole power of his office, and succeeded 
in defeating it. Nor was this accomplished without 
personal peril. In April, 1861, when the blood of the 
loyal soldiers of Massachusetts was treasonably shed in 
the streets of our chief city, and its power for some 
days was wielded by men who, for the most part, were 
resolved on rushing the State into rebellion, it was 
obvious to those who witnessed the scenes of the day, 
and moved among the parties who engaged in them, 
that Governor Hicks was an object of such intense 
animosity that his safety was not assured. This is not 
the occasion to dwell on these events. It is consoling 
to her loyal sons, to whom the good name of the State 
and city is so dear, that they terminated without effect- 
ing their design ; and gladly would they have them 
forever forgotten. In these trying moments the gov- 
ernor was true to his duty. Throughout his term of 
office he devoted himself with untiring industry and an 
ever-watchful patriotism, by every legal means, to crush 
out the spirit of secession and to retain the State in her 



1) 

HON. T. n. HICKS. 7 



allegiance to the Union; and he succeeded. When he 
ceased to be her governor she was loyal in all the de- 
partments of her government, and the people, by a voice 
approaching unanimity, proclaimed their fixed resolve 
to stand by the Union, not only as a matter of almost 
holy duty, but as indispensable to their safety and pros- 
perity; and so she and they have been ever since. It 
is not going too far to declare that this result is in a 
great measure to be referred to the conduct of Gover- 
nor Hicks. Had he listened to those who counselled a 
different poHcy; had he lent the power of his office to 
accomplish their object ; had he even failed to devote it 
entirely to their frustration, Maryland might this day 
have been a desert, and her name dishonored in the 
estimation of all good and wise men. To lose such a 
citizen at any time would be cause of general sorrow; 
to lose him now, before the rebeUion is terminated, is 
to be the more lamented, even on his own account. 
Who can fail to regret that a public servant so faithful, 
so patriotic, and so efficient in his efforts to maintain 
the authority of the Union in his own State, had not 
been permitted to survive until that authority had been 
securely extended over every other State ? 

Such was his own prayer. In an address to the 
people of the State, of the 7th of January, 1861, he 
said : 

" In the course of nature I cannot have long to live, and I fervently 
trust to be allowed to end my days a citizen of tliis glorious Union. 
But should I be compelled to witness the downfall of that govern- 
ment inherited from our fathers, established as it were by the special 
favor of God, I will at least have the consolation at my dying hour 
that I neither by word or deed assisted in hastening its disruption." 

m ^ m 




His prayer was not granted ; but his last days of intel- 
ligence on earth were cheered by the sanguine hope 
that the time was fast approaching when we should all 
be again citizens of that glorious Union ; and if he ap- 
prehended that that hope might be defeated and the 
Union destroyed, he certainly had the consolation, so 
faithfully secured to himself, that no word or deed of 
his could have assisted or hastened the catastrophe. 
To this body it is unnecessary to say anything of his 
official conduct as one of its members. Ever courteous, 
kind, and attentive, he possessed the esteem and confi- 
dence of us all. Endowed with a sound judgment and 
animated by a fervent patriotism, he supported every 
measure that promised, in his opinion, to benefit the 
country in its existing emergency. In private life, too, 
he was always highly appreciated ; and by those who 
knew him intimately loved as a brother. By the society 
of his county his loss especially will be long and keenly 
felt, and to his immediate family be irreparable. Their 
consolation will be in knowing that he leaves behind him 
an unstained name that will ever live and be honored, 
and that his last thoughts were devoted to that religious 
faith on which he relied with humble but Christian 
confidence for future happiness. 

I move the adoption of the following resolutions : 

Resolved unanimously. That the members of the Senate, from a 
sincere desire of showing every mark of respect to the memory of 
Hon. Thomas Holliday Hicks, deceased, a senator from the State 
of Maryland, will go into monrning for the residue of the present 
session by the usual mode of wearing crape on the left arm. 



'(Ol 



HON. T. H. HICKS. 



Resolved, unaninwusly. That the members of the Senate will attend 
the funeral of the deceased from the Senate chamber at two o'clock 
p. m. to-day, and that the committee of arrangements superintend the 
same. 

Ordered, That the Secretary communicate these proceedings to 
the House of Representatives. 



Address of Mr. Hale, of Neiv Hmnpshire. 

Mr. President : One of the effects of that civil strife 
which now afflicts and rends our unhappy country is 
found in the indifference to human suffering, and to 
death itself, consequent upon the frequency and rapidity 
with which our daily narrative of blood presents to our 
view scenes of carnage and slaughter such as the history 
of the world has not hitherto disclosed. 

As the panorama moves on, we are only relieved from 
the contemplation of the mangled limbs and mutilated 
bodies of the dead and the dying by the appaUing spec- 
tacle of our more unfortunate brethren languishing and 
dying in the hopeless and helpless condition of prisoners 
of war, where manhood is worn out, hope crushed, and 
life destroyed by the cruel and heartless privation of 
the necessary provision of that scanty supply of food 
and clothing by which human life can be sustained. 

It is a most melancholy and humiliating fact that 
pictures such as these, sketched from no creation of the 
imagination, but drawn in the crimson hues of the best 
blood of crur bravest and best, and proclaimed to us on 
every breeze from the south in the agonizing cry of our 

k ^ — ' fii 



m @ 

10 OBITUARY ADDRESSES. 

languishing brethren, re-echoed by the wail of the 
widow and the orphan in our midst, have failed to move 
our hearts as but a little while since they would have 
done, even had they been representations of what was 
occurring among strangers of another country, and we 
look upon them almost as the natural and necessary 
consequences of the war we are waging for our national 
life. 

To-day we are called upon to witness another phase 
of human experience by which it would seem that Divine 
Providence would try upon us the experiment of a more 
quiet, and, if it may be so expressed, a more unobtrusive 
exhibition of the frailty of life and the certainty of death 
than in the havoc and destruction of battle. Death has 
now come, not clothed in the pomp and circumstance of 
war, numbering his victims by hundreds and thousands; 
but in the peace, the quiet, and serenity of a sick cham- 
ber, an old man, full of years and of honors, has gone to 
his reward. 

But, although his years were not few, still they were 
not so many that friendship might not have reasonably 
hoped that they might have been extended yet longer, 
and he been permitted to have witnessed in the future 
history of his country, which he had loved and served so 
well, the fruits of his labors and sacrifices. 

When the history of our great struggle shall be 
written, when the story of the toils, the suiferings, the 
sacrifices, and the efforts by which our political salvation 
was attained shall be told, and impartial posterity shall 
inscribe on immortal tablets the illustrious * names of 
those by whose clear sagacity, unshaken firmness, and 

m 



p — _ u 

HON. T. H. HICKS. 11 

patriotic devotion to duty in a great crisis of our coun- 
try's history, her integrity was preserved and her ultimate 
triumph secured, second to none on that proud roll of 
fame shall stand the name of Thomas Holliday Hicks, 
late governor of Maryland. 

The political and especially the geographical position 
of his State was such as to give pre-eminent consequence 
at that very critical period of our history to the course 
which she might take. The intense interest which was 
excited all over the country in regard to the position of 
affairs in Maryland cannot have escaped the recollection 
of those who hear me. The extremely doubtful char- 
acter of her legislature, to say the least, and the position 
to which her people might be driven by popular appeals 
of disloyal men to her prejudices and her supposed inter- 
ests, filled the hearts of patriots throughout the land 
with the most painful solicitude. Whatever may be 
thought now, it is not too much to say that at that time 
it was felt and feared that upon the decision which she 
might make between loyalty and treason, in no small 
degree dejDcnded the safety and salvation of the republic. 
In saying this, I entirely disclaim any impeachment of 
the loyalty and integrity of the great masses of the 
people of Maryland. I have no doubt they are true 
and loyal now, and that they were so then; neither have 
I the slightest doubt that that was equally true then of 
the great body of the people in numbers of those States 
that now are, and for nearly four years have been, in open 
rebellion against the government of the country ; but 
by the bold and decisive action of bad men, forgetting 
the claims of country, the obhgations of loyalty, and the 

i) 



12 OBITUARY ADDRESSES. 

duty of patriotism, they were driven in an evil hour into 
the vortex of treason, the crime of rebellion, and the 
horrors of civil war. 

From such a state of things it was the good fortune 
of the people of Maryland to be saved in no small degree 
by the peculiar sagacity and devoted patriotism of her 
most excellent governor, whose death we are now called 
upon to deplore. It was most providential and fortunate, 
both for the State and the Union, that Maryland at that 
time had a governor fully equal to the emergencies of 
the hour. He saw and comprehended the danger from 
a distance, and although we may not all of us approve 
the wisdom of every step which he took and every 
measure which he recommended, yet no one, it is 
believed, will now doubt the unsullied integrity of his 
conduct, the purity of his motives, or the entire devotion 
of his patriotism. 

Like the prophet standing on Mount Carmel, he saw 
the cloud yet a great way off, while it was no bigger 
than a man's hand, and did not wait till its portentous 
blackness had shrouded the whole heavens in its gloom. 
Of him, and in reference to his conduct in that hour, it 
may with emphasis be said that 

" Peace liath lier victories 
No less reuowned than war." 

Such, in brief, was the course of our friend in that 
interesting and momentous period of our country. His 
must be an overweening ambition that will not be 
satisfied with such a record. 



m- 



p ^ ^ jSl 

HON. T. II. IIICKS. 13 

Of the early history of Governor Hicks, of the dis- 
cijiline and experience which formed the character so 
admirably and exactly fitted for the extraordinary part 
which Providence assigned him to perform in the great 
drama of his country, I have no knowledge. My per- 
sonal acquaintance with him commenced about the time 
of the beginning of those troubles which have culmi- 
nated in the present civil war ; and I hope I may be 
permitted, without the imputation of unwarrantable 
egotism, to add that that acquaintance originated in a 
request communicated to me by his direction on the 
occasion of a visit on his part to this city, that I would 
call and consult and confer with him on the engrossing 
questions of the day. That acquaintance thus com- 
menced continued without interruption to the day of 
his death. 

When he was elected to this body, by the action of 
the Senate he was assigned to a place on the Committee 
on Naval Affairs, of which I was then chairman. 

Our intercourse from that circumstance became more 
intimate and familiar, and I will add that, in the course 
of a life now numbering many years, I have never met 
a more kind, genial, and courteous gentleman. 

No man more sincerely sympathized with that awak- 
ened philanthropy which seeks in overthrowing the 
rebellion also to destroy its cause, than he. But he 
entertained such a deep faith in the humanity and 
Christianity of his own people that he preferred to 
have the work done by them., unawed and uninfluenced 
by any outside interference. Still, I speak from perfect 
knowledge derived from frequent interviews and con- 

m I — ii 



versations with him, when I say that the abohtion of 
African slavery had no more sincere supporter. 

Such was our friend. As death approached no retro- 
spect of misspent time, of neglected opportunities for 
good, cast fearful shadows on the future, but with a 
consciousness that he had been permitted in the good 
providence of God to do something, yea much, for a 
great and good cause, to have his name written among 
the benefactors of his country, and by his influence to 
add strength to the cause of the weak, the oppressed, 
and the humble, at peace with the world, and, as we 
humbly and trustfully hope, with his God, he has gone 
to his rest. 



Address of Mr. Willey, of West Virginia. 

Mr. Peesident : I had no personal acquaintance with 
Governor Hicks until he took his seat as a member of 
this body. But I had learned to honor and respect him 
before I knew him. During the session of the Virginia 
convention which passed the unfortunate ordinance 
which assumed to renounce the allegiance due from 
that State to the national government, the noble position 
maintained by Governor Hicks, as the chief magistrate 
of Maryland, won the confidence and admiration of the 
loyal people of Virginia. Especially did we of West 
Virginia feel grateful to him; for, if Maryland had 
seceded, it would, we well knew, have greatly increased 
our perils and embarrassed our efforts to preserve our 
integrity. 

m m 



m ^ 

HON. T. n. HICKS. 15 

I shall not, Mr. President, attempt to review the 
connexion of Governor Hicks with the events of that 
dark day in our country's history. The distinguished 
colleague of the deceased has appropriately and eloquently 
done so. Suffice it for me to say that the page on which 
those events shall be recorded will be illustrious in the 
history of Maryland, and will entitle the name of 
Grovernor Hicks to be honored and revered as long as 
that State or the nation endures. 

It has been my privilege to occupy a seat by the 
side of Governor Hicks ever since he entered this hall. 
I had, therefore, an opportunity not only to witness his 
course in relation to public aifairs, but also to observe 
more closely the spirit and principles, the heart and 
motive (so to speak) which seemed to prompt and 
control his conduct. And I declare to you, sir, that I 
never knew a man whose simplicity and singleness of 
purpose — whose evident sincerity, purity, and unselfish- 
ness of aim to promote the honor and welfare of his 
country, commanded more of my confidence and respect. 
I know not if he ever aspired to win the personal 
distinction and renown which men of great intellectual 
parts sometimes seem to seek with an ardor hardly 
secondary to the promotion of the national welfare ; 
but to me he ever appeared to forget himself in the 
higher and holier purpose of securing the public good. 

When he resumed his seat here in the earlier part 
of this session, the ravages of disease upon him were 
painfully apparent; and in conversation with him on 
different occasions, he more than intimated to me his 
presentiment that death was at his door. And, sir, you 

m M 




will allow me to express my gratification that in his zeal 
for his country he did not forget his obligations to his 
Creator. And here, I think, we shall find the explanation 
of his singular conscientiousness in the discharge of 
his duty. He feared God ; and therefore he was true 
to his country. Therefore it was that the hand so 
affectingly raised by him in the dying hour, in token of 
the favor and friendship of Heaven, refused, while 
strong with vigor of health and manhood, to strike at 
the life of the nation when surrounded by both friends 
and foes vehemently urging him to perpetrate the deed. 

Mr. President, I am a believer in the assertion that 
pure and practical Christianity is a political necessity 
under our form of government. I believe that it is 
essential to the perpetuity of our free institutions. 
Christian morality is the only sure basis of our civil 
liberties; and I trust I may be pardoned for saying 
that the Christian statesman is the only safe guardian 
of the people's rights. Had the spirit and power of 
the gospel controlled the conduct of the eminent and 
highly accomplished men who occupied the seats 
immediately surrounding me in 1861, I feel assured 
that the horrors of the present civil war would never 
have cursed the land. 

I therefore think it is the highest tribute which could 
be paid to the memory of the deceased to say, here in 
this high place of the nation, that he was a conscientious, 
Christian statesman. 



The resolutions were unanimously adopted. 



icS' 



m. 



HON. T. H. HICKS. 17 



IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, 
Wednesday, February 15, ]865. 



A message was received from the Senate, by Mr. 
HiCKEY, their chief clerk, in reference to the death of 
Thomas Holliday Hicks, a Senator from the State of 
Maryland. 

The message was read, as follows : 

Resolved unanimously, That the members of the Senate, from a 
sincere desire of showing every mark of respect to the memory of 
Hon. Thomas Holliday Hicks, deceased, a Senator from the State 
of Maryland, will go into mourning for the residue of the present 
session, by the usual mode of wearing crape on the left arm. 

Resolved unanimously, That the members of the Senate will attend 
the funeral of the deceased from the Senate chamber at two o'clock 
p. m. to-day; and that the committee of arrangements superintend 
the same. 

Ordered, That the Secretary communicate these proceedings to 
the House of Representatives, with the request that that House 
unite in the ceremonies of this occasion. 

Address of Mr. Webster, of Maryland. 

Mr. Speaker : I desire to say, preceding my remarks 
on this sad occasion, that my colleague [Mr. Davis] is 
detained from the House by indisposition ; otherwise 
he would take part in these proceedings. 

Mr. Speaker, it becomes my painfid duty to announce 
to the House of Representatives the death of Hon. 
Thomas Holliday Hicks, a Senator in Congress from 

U' m 




the State of Maryland. He died at the Metropolitan 
hotel, in this city, on Monday last, February 13, 1865. 

In the winter of 1864 Mr. Hicks received a severe 
injury to his left ankle, which, a few weeks later, 
compelled the amputation of his foot above the ankle 
joint. From the effects of this loss he never entirely 
recovered, and though he continued to attend to the 
laborious duties of his position, yet his friends perceived 
that much of his former physical vigor was gone, and 
that he was greatly overtaxing his strength. About 
two weeks before his death he ceased to occupy his 
seat in the Senate chamber, and a skilful physician 
was called to see him. His friends still believed that 
rest and quiet would restore to a considerable degree 
his strength, and fondly hoped that his life might be 
spared for many years to come. But on Friday morning 
last he was entirely prostrated by an attack of paralysis, 
and though he maintained his consciousness until within 
a few hours of his death, yet all hope of his recovery 
was then abandoned. From this time he sank gradually 
until the hour of his dissolution, when calmly, without 
a struggle or a groan, his spirit passed from earth. 

It will be consoling to his afflicted children, who were 
unable to reach this city before his death, as well as his 
numberless friends, to know that loving hearts and 
skilfid hands assiduously ministered to all his wants, 
and strove, as far as human agency could, to alleviate 
all his sufferings. Nor were the consolations of our 
holy religion wanting. An eminent divine and his 
personal friend (Rev. Dr. Nadal) piously attended at 
his bedside and pointed his thoughts "to the world 



■m 



HON. T. H. HICKS. 19 



that is to come." To him my dying and lamented 
friend, even after the power of speech was gone, by 
hand upraised to heaven, and face glowing with celestial 
light, mimistakably declared his faith in a crucified 
Redeemer, and his implicit trust in His promises and 
atonement. 

Governor Hicks was born in Dorchester county, 
Maryland, September 2, 1798. His father was a 
respectable farmer, with limited means and a large 
family, able to give his son little advantages of educa- 
tion. As a boy, he attended the common country schools 
of the neighborhood, then even more indifferent than 
now. As a youth, he assisted his father in the cultivation 
of the farm; and when manhood came, he went forth 
from the paternal roof to struggle unaided against the 
rude buffetings of the world, and, by the fierce contests 
he thus waged with the pride and prejudices and 
position of those around him, to fit himself for that 
fiercer contest which he was long after to wage with 
the passions and prejudices of the enemies of his 
country. Shortly after arriving at his majority he was 
appointed a constable, and so diligently, so faithfully, 
and with such uprightness did he discharge the duties 
of this humble office, that in 1824, then in the twenty- 
sixth year of his age, he was elected sheriff of his native 
county, a position of importance and respectability, 
which he filled much to his own credit and to the entire 
satisfaction of the community. 

After this, he was several times elected to the legis- 
lature of his State, and in 1836 was chosen a member 
of the senatorial electoral college of Maryland. He 

m ii 




took a prominent part in the efforts to organize that 
body, which attracted so much attention throughout 
the country. Shortly afterward he was selected as one 
of the members of Governor Vezey's council, and in 
1838 was appointed by that gentleman the register of 
wills for Dorchester county. This office, under the 
testamentary system of Maryland, one of great import- 
ance, he occupied for nearly twenty years, being reap- 
pointed by Governor Pratt in 1844, and elected by the 
l^eople in 1850. Never did a faithful officer more ably 
discharge the responsible duties of this position. The 
widow and the orphan always found in him a friend, 
who spared no labor to protect their interests and defend 
them from injustice and wrong. He soon became 
perfectly familiar with the testamentary laws of the 
State, and so completely did the people of his county 
rely upon the wisdom of his official decisions, and the 
purity and fairness of his friendly counsels, that it was 
rare indeed that litigation grew out of his settlement 
of the estates of deceased persons. In 1850 he took 
part in the constitutional convention of Maryland, which 
framed the constitution of that date, and was known as 
a laborious and influential member of that body. 

His reputation had now extended over his entire 
State, and in 1857 he was elected governor of Maryland, 
and entered upon the discharge of the duties of this 
high office in January, 1858. For four years he 
occupied the gubernatorial chair. A few months after 
the conclusion of his term, in December, 1862, by the 
death of the late lamented James A. Pearce, a vacancy 
occurred from the State of Maryland in the Senate of 

m m 



m^ ai 

HON. T. H. HICKS. 21 



the United States. To this Governor Bradford, repre- 
senting the wishes of the Union people of the State, 
appointed Governor Hicks, and a year later, on the 
assembling of the legislature, he was elected to fill the 
balance of the unexpired term ending March 4, 1867. 

This, in brief, is the history of my late lamented 
colleague. There is one portion of his life, however, 
that deserves, ay demands, at my hands more extended 
notice. It was during his term as governor of Maryland 
that the present wicked rebellion was inaugurated ; and 
well was it for Maryland and her people, well was it 
for the capital of the nation, and the national honor, if 
not life, that Thomas Holliday Hicks was then the 
governor of Maryland. Sir, as I sat in grief by his dying 
bedside, and saw " the strong man bowed," palsied with 
disease and helpless as an infant, in my inmost soul I 
thanked God that that divine visitation had not come 
while his hand yet held the helm of my native and 
beloved State. What scenes of anarchy, of confusion, 
of bloodshed, and desolation to her fair fields, would 
have followed, my heart sickens to contemplate. But 
his natural vigor was not then abated. The lessons of 
self-reliance which he had learned in his early and 
maturer manhood, that decision of character and firm- 
ness of purpose which had become a part of his nature, 
and above all his instinctive and unquenchable love of 
country — that country under whose benign institutions he 
had risen, and all others might rise, from the humblest 
walks of life — had fitted and prepared him to resist all 
efforts, coming from what quarter soever, which looked 
to a disruption of the Union and placing Maryland by 



m- 




the side of her rebeUious sisters. Any one who will 
recall the history of the four months which immediately 
preceded Mr. Lincoln's inauguration in 1861 will remem- 
ber how repeated and persistent these efforts were. 

The plan of the original conspirators, as has since 
become apparent, was to unite, if possible, all the slave- 
holding States in one common movement, seize the 
capital and the public archives before the inauguration 
of Mr. Lincoln, overthrow the government, establish a 
southern confederacy, and then admit such of the non- 
slaveholding States as might be willing to introduce the 
institutions of the south among them. 

It was essentially necessary to secure the co-operation 
of Maryland to succeed in these infamous purposes. 
The capital stood upon the ancient soil of that State, 
and according to the peculiar views of these conspirators, 
Maryland had the right, not only to sever her connexion 
with the Union, but also to reclaim her grant of the 
District of Columbia. This would have given them 
color of authority in holding on to the capital, establish- 
ing here the seat of their government, and demanding 
recognition from foreign powers. It was also of the 
first importance to these conspirators that their friends 
in Maryland should be organized and armed, ready for 
the emergency, that when the time for action came they 
might swoop down upon the capital before assistance 
could be obtained from the northern States. All this 
could only be done through the legislature of that State. 
Fortunately the sessions of the legislature were biennial. 
It had been in session the winter before, and would not 
again assemble until January, 1862. 

13 m 



HON. T. 11. HICKS. 23 

The great majority of this legislature was known to 
be in sympathy with the southern leaders. At its session 
in 1860 it had passed the most obnoxious law on the 
subject of slavery ever placed on the statute-books of 
Maryland. Contrary to the wishes of a great majority 
of the people, contrary to their practices from time 
immemorial, and contrary to their conscientious convic- 
tions of right, they enacted that thereafter no slaves 
should ever be emancipated by their owners in that 
State. More than this. Taking advantage of the excite- 
ment produced by John Brown's invasion of Virginia, 
they had appropriated $70,000 for the purchase of arms, 
and provided for their distribution throughout the State. 
I repeat, a great majority of this legislature was known 
to be in favor of Maryland taking her position with the 
other slaveholding States, 

In Maryland the governor has no power of veto, so 
that when assembled the legislature is entirely beyond 
his control; but he alone had the authority to assemble 
it in special session. It was then of the highest import- 
ance to the conspirators that he should exercise this 
authority. Soon after Mr. Lincoln's election in 1860, 
the public efforts to induce him to take this step began 
to be made. Some of the most prominent men in that 
part of the State in which Annapolis, the capital of the 
State, is situated, assembled in that city, and requested 
that this should be done. Governor Hicks emphatically 
declined. Public meetings were then called in those 
portions of the State where the slaveholding interest 
predominated, demanding the assembling of the legisla- 
ture. Governor Hicks refused to notice their demands. 

— ^ 



m 

24 OBITUAEY ADDRESSES. 

Shortly afterward the president of the senate of Maryland 
and the speaker of the house of delegates, for themselves 
and in the nanie of their respective bodies, addressed 
him, urging that they should be convened. Governor 
Hicks stood like adamant, declaring that he saw no 
good reason for such action, and that Maryland was, 
and would be forever, for the Union. While thus beset 
at home, he was also approached from beyond the limits 
of the State. After the Congress assembled here in 
December, 1860, the leading southern men who had 
seats in these halls used all their efforts to inflame the 
minds of the people of Maryland to compel the governor 
to assemble the legislature. Commissioners were sent 
to him directly from the States of Alabama, Mississippi, 
and South Carolina, all urging that Maryland should 
move in the same coUimn with them; but to no purpose. 
The polar star to Governor Hicks was his country, the 
union of these States. The waves of sectional strife 
rose higher and higher. State after State fell away 
from its allegiance. He stood firm. The day of the 
inauguration came. President Lincoln assumed the 
robes of office, and entered upon the discharge of the 
high duties of the Chief Magistrate of the United 
States. From many hearts in the loyal States, as well 
as from the loyal people of his own State, earnestly 
watching his course, and full of apprehension, there 
rose up the prayer, "God bless Governor Hicks." 
The capital was still in the hands of the friends of the 
Union. The noble ship which soon was to drive into 
the storm and tempest of civil war, which have not and 
shall not destroy her, then, indeed, had made her most 

M— m 



m- 



HON. T. H. HICKS. 25 



narrow escape from destruction on the hidden rocks of 
treachery and of treason. Sir, I doii])t not that the 
impartial historian who shall hereafter write the story 
of the perils of the Republic will declare that the most 
critical period in its history was that which immediately 
preceded the inauguration of President Lincoln; that 
Thomas Holliday Hicks, by the blessing of God at 
that time the governor of Maryland, did more than any 
other man to save it from destruction. 

I am aware, sir, that, a few weeks later, when an 
infuriated mob, excited by rebel emissaries, and armed, 
took possession of the city of Baltimore, murdering the 
soldiers of the United States passing through to the 
capital, and raising a great commotion throughout the 
State, Governor Hicks, having gone to that city to secure 
the peaceful passage through it of these troops, found 
himself in the power of this mob, and seemed to yield 
for a time in part to their demands. But never, even 
then, for a moment did he give up his devotion to his 
country, or counsel resistance to its laws. True, for 
a few days he besought the President not to pass 
troops through the State. This was done alone through 
apprehension that the scenes of that bloody day just 
passed would be re-enacted, while he was powerless to 
prevent it, and that his beloved State and city would be 
laid waste with fire and sword, destroying the innocent 
with the guilty. I confess he was in error. I may 
safely say that subsequent events convinced him that 
he was in error; but it was an error of judgment only ; 
and who is infallible ? Never for the briefest space of 
time did he desire to aid the cause of the rebels, or 

p ri 




intend to do aught to injure his country, or resist its laws. 
It is true, too, that he then convened the legislature of 
Maryland ; but this was done only after a revolutionary 
call for it to assemble in the city of Baltimore, similar 
to that which put the State of Texas into the attitude 
of rebellion, had been issued by one of the most influ- 
ential members of the State legislature, Coleman Yellott, 
now in the rebel confederacy. Governor Hicks, to 
prevent this revolutionary session which would have 
taken place in Baltimore, then in the hands of the 
secessionists, convened the legislature at Frederick city, 
in the midst of a loyal population thoroughly roused, 
and with a local organized military force of nearly four 
hundred muskets. I have always thought that the 
assembling of the legislature at that time and under 
those circumstances was a wise exercise of executive 
authority. It at once produced quiet in Maryland. It 
gave time for many who had been swept away by the 
first fierce gust of passion to indulge in " the sober 
second thought," and to return to their allegiance. The 
legislature, too, was powerless for mischief They dared 
not, even if they had desired, while the loyal citizens 
of western Maryland thronged in their halls, and scowled 
defiance in their faces, put the State of Maryland into 
an attitude of hostility to the general government. As 
my venerable colleague who sits behind me [Governor 
Thomas] once said in this House, they would have been 
hurled from their windows upon the glistening bayonets 
below ; and well they knew it. 

Within ten days after the massacre of the troops in 
Baltimore Governor Hicks was in cordial and earnest 



nON. T. H. HICKS. 27 



co-operation with the national authorities in this city, 
and a few days later issued his proclamation calling for 
four Maryland regiments to march to its defence. 

Mr. Speaker, however much others may have doubted 
or may now doubt the loyalty of Governor Hicks 
because of this one error during that terrible week, the 
Union-loving people of Maryland, who knew him well, 
never for one moment lost confidence in his patriotism. 
No man, since the days of the Revolution, has lived in 
Maryland, who has had so entirely the confidence and 
affection of the patriotic people of that State as Governor 
Hicks. They have loved him with a pure and an ardent 
affection. They have trusted him without an appre- 
hension or a doubt. He was their pilot in the hour of 
deepest gloom and most threatening danger. They 
gathered around him as the exponent of their principles 
and the worthy representative of their love of country ; 
and when the sad news went out from this city that he 
was no more, there were thousands of eyes in his native 
State, that had never seen him, dimmed with tears, and 
thousands of hearts filled with sorrow for his loss. And 
to-day the governor and legislature of his State, as well 
as the corporate authorities of its great metropolis, fully 
representing the people in their action, are here in the 
capitol of the nation to pay the last tribute of respect 
to his memory, not as a matter of form, not to join in 
an empty pageant, but as exhibiting the love and rever- 
ence of the entire people of the State for his character 
and their sincere sorrow for his death. With them I 
desire to pay my humble tribute to his worth, and to 
drop a sorrowing tear on his grave. 



A few words more in regard to the character of my 
colleague and I am done. Governor Hicks was entirely 
a self-made man. He toiled up the mountain-side 
unaided, and reached height after height through his 
own manly exertions ; but never did he break the bond 
which bound him to the people on the plain. He was 
essentially a man of the people ; of them and from them, 
his instincts, his sympathies, aifections, were all with 
them, and his exertions and labors in their behalf The 
poorest and most friendless boy received from him as 
kindly a welcome as the men who held the most influ- 
ential and important stations. The last note that I ever 
received from him, only a few days before his death, 
was written to ask my aid for a poor man, a sailor disabled 
in the service of his country, and in which he regretted 
that his health would not permit him personally to 
render him such assistance as he desired. Governor 
Hicks, from the character of his early pursuits, had no 
opportunity for cultivating a taste for books, and was 
consequently not a man of general reading or informa- 
tion ; yet he possessed great natural sagacity, had a broad 
and well-balanced mind, and easily mastered any subject 
to which he turned his attention. He thoroughly under- 
stood the political history of the country. There was 
nothing narrow or illiberal in his character, and his 
catholic spirit showed itself in almost every action of 
his life. He was generous and sincere, quick to forgive, 
and never cherished resentments. Though his mind 
was not quick in its perceptions and conclusions, yet 
when he had reached such conclusions, he was as firm 
as a rock, fixed as the hills. No word of suspicion has 



m- 



(D) 'm 

HON. T. H. HICKS. 29 



ever been breathed against his integrity. He was an 
honest man, 

" The noblest work of God." 

That, however, which has most distinguished him 
and endeared him to the people of Maryland was his 
unselfish and unyielding patriotism. In him was illus- 
trated that patriotism which burned so purely in the 
hearts of the men of '76. There was no personal 
sacrifice which he deemed too great to be made for his 
country. This was particularly illustrated in his course 
on the question of emancipation. Though holding a 
considerable number of slaves at the breaking out of 
the rebellion, and entering into the war with the impres- 
sion that it ought to be so conducted as not to interfere 
with slavery, yet when he became convinced, as he 
afterward did, that the most vulnerable point in the 
rebellion was slavery, and that if we would crush the 
rebellion we must strike at and crush slavery, he did 
not hesitate to favor this policy both by the general 
government and by his own State. A year ago he 
favored the constitutional amendment lately passed 
abolishing slavery throughout the United States, and 
was the earnest friend of immediate emancipation in 
Maryland, voting himself for the free constitution and 
urging others to unite with him in its support. 

But he has gone, never to return. To-day the grave 
will close on his mortal remains. For the monument 
which shall rise above his remains, he has prepared his 
own epitaph. Addressing the people of Maryland by 



30 OBITUARY ADDRESSES. 

proclamation, in the midst of the dangers which encircled 
them in June, 1861, he said : 

'• In the course of nature I cannot have long to live, and I fervently 
trust to be allowed to end my days a citizen of this glorious Union. 
But should I be compelled to witness the downfall of that govern- 
ment inherited from our fathers, established as it were by the special 
favor of God, I will at least have the consolation at my dying hour 
that I neither by word nor deed assisted in hastening its disruption." 

Sir, let this sublime paragraph be engraved on his 
tomb. It shall live when the marble shall have crumbled 
and mingled with his dust. And let us, the living, 
learn lessons of patriotism from his proud example, for 
though dead he yet liveth. 

I offer the following resolutions: 

Resolved, That this House has heai-d with deep sensibility the 
announcement of the death of Hon. Thomas Holliday Hicks, a 
senator in Congress from the State of Maryland. 

Resolved, That as a testimony of respect for the memory of the 
deceased, the members and officers of this House will wear the 
usual badge of mourning for thirty days. 

Resolved, That the proceedings of this House in relation to the 
death of Hon. Thomas Holliday Hicks be communicated to the 
family of the deceased by the Clerk. 

Resolved, That this House will, as a body, repair to the Senate 
chamber to attend the funeral of the deceased, and upon its return 
to the hall that the Speaker declare the House adjourned. 



Address of Mr. Creswell, of Maryland. 

Mr. Speaker : Duty imposes no unwilling task when 
it demands my humble tribute to the memory of the 
lamented deceased. The praises due to a long career 
of honor and usefulness are always freely lavished upon 



S- 



m T3 

HON, T. H. HICKS. 31 

the grave. The stranger, in seeking to give utterance 
only to his admiration for the public life and character 
of the dead, will be content with the employment of 
merely formal and conventional terms of respect. But 
the hand of affection, in its anxious desire to keep fresh 
and green a cherished memory, would fain pluck from 
heaven a sprig of the immortal amaranth, and plant it 
upon the grave where the loved one sleeps, in the hope, 
fond though vain, that even the tomb may be thus 
clothed with the freshness and the bloom of eternal 
beauty. 

My colleague, who has preceded me, has spoken of 
what Governor Hicks has accomplished for his State 
and country. It is eminently proper that the record of 
his public life should on this occasion be reviewed and 
commended. But mine is a more sacred office. I 
represent the county of his nativity, wherein he spent 
his long life, surrounded by the friends and associations 
of his youth. Among my constituents are those who 
were captivated by his generous heart long before the 
days of his political triumphs ; those who regarded 
him, when living, with unselfish love, and who, now that 
death has stricken him down, will receive the sad tidings 
with tears of profound regret. It is my duty to attempt 
in some measure to soothe the grief and to mitigate the 
sorrow of his family and personal friends. 

I have not known Governor Hicks as long as my 
friend who to-day has made the formal announcement 
of his decease. My personal acquaintance began late 
in the year 1861, but long before the day of his death, 
notwithstanding our disparity in years, his many generous 




qualities, combined with his fervent patriotism, had won 
my affection and sincere esteem. I am not ashamed to 
confess to the humblest of his friends that I, too, have 
wept over his unexpected and painfLil death. 

We who knew him well, who freely mingled with 
him in social intercourse, who think we understood his 
nature and fairly appreciated his faults as well as his 
virtues, are unwilUng that posterity, in making an 
estimate of the character of Governor Hicks, shall be 
confined to the dry details of the historian: 

" History preserves only the flesliless bones 
Of what we are, and by the mocking skull 
The would-be wise pretend to guess the features ! 
Without the roundness and the glow of life 
How hideous is the skeleton ! "Without 
The colorings and humanities that clothe 
Our errors, the anatomists of schools 
Can make our memory hideous." 

Thomas Holliday Hicks was no scholar, no orator. 
Notwithstanding the many disadvantages under which 
he labored, it is safe to say that no man has exerted a 
greater influence on the politics of Maryland, or has 
accomplished more for the good of his State and fellow- 
citizens in his day and generation, than he. He chose 
his party because of his approval of the principles which 
it proclaimed, and then gave it his entire and cordial 
support. A disciple of Henry Clay, he accepted the 
teachings of the Sage of Ashland as the axioms of his 
political creed. He was first a democrat of the old 
school, then a whig, then an American, and on the 
formation of the Union party he threw his whole soul 
into that movement and labored unceasingly to promote 



HON. T. H. HICKS. 33 

its success. To all the parties to which he was succes- 
sively attached he rendered the most important services. 
He was always looked up to as a leader, and always did 
the work of a leader. 

Yet he was not a brilliant man in any respect. His 
great distinguishing mental characteristic was his intui- 
tive knowledge of human nature, and his great capacity 
for the management of men. His mind was eminently 
practical, and he dealt with men and things as they were. 
He sometimes entered into public discussions on the 
hustings, and frequently exhibited great tact and astute- 
ness in debate. He proclaimed his sentiments every- 
where, and never ceased to inculcate what he believed 
to be the truth. But the great arena of his triumphs 
was the social circle. Wheresoever known, he had so 
completely the confidence of men of every position in 
life, high as well as low, that his views were often quoted 
as having the weight of authority. The people of his 
own county seemed to hang with pleasure on his words 
and to delight in paying him honor. 

His house at Appleby was open to all the world, and 
especially was it the refuge of the afflicted. He was 
the friend and counsellor of all in trouble. His purse 
was open to every meritorious demand for assistance. 
Although free from all ostentation, and for many years 
in receipt of a respectable income, his boundless charities 
and his disposition to aid others kept him continually 
in straitened circumstances. He was in truth the friend 
and benefactor of the poor, not only ministering to their 
wants, but ever lending them a willing sympathy. 

" When that the poor have cried, Caesar hath wept." 



m ' u 

34 OBITUARY ADDRESSES. 

Even his political enemies acknowledged his manifold 
and unwearied kindnesses, and his excellent qualities as 
a man and a neighbor. So clear and pure was he in all 
the relations of private life that even malice was com- 
pelled to bear witness to his exalted worth. 

Thomas Holliday Hicks was governor of his native 
State in the early stages of the rebellion. His manage- 
ment of State affairs during that period has been 
subjected to the severest scrutiny and to the most unfair 
criticism. It has been the habit to talk of him and his 
conduct as if he had nothing to do but to call his friends 
around him and summon the military of the State to 
the defence of the national capital. Alas ! in that hour 
of sore trial his friends were beyond the sound of his 
voice, and the military were in arms against their country. 
Those who clustered about him to proffer advice were 
his life-long enemies. The host which gathered at his 
hotel was a hooting mob, yelling like demons and 
threatening to hang him to the nearest lamp-post. 
Blood had already been shed ; treason was rife ; civil 
war was flagrant. The dead of a sister State, foully 
slain by traitors in the streets of Baltimore, had been 
counted as the first mangled and blood-stained victims 
of rebellion. Secession was fully armed. Much of the 
machinery of government was in the hands of rebels. 
Everything was uncertain. Men in high places were 
no longer to be trusted. The Union sentiment was 
utterly without organization, and was taken totally by 
surprise. The governor stood alone among his foes. 
Then the tempters said to him, " Let us avoid bloodshed 
among Marylanders ; let us prevent war in our streets ; 



@ ■■ ^ m 

HON. T. H. HICKS. 35 

let US have peace among ourselves." He cared not for 
himself, and they knew it; but they appealed to his love 
for his people, and exhorted him to quiet the excitement 
and prevent further strife and massacre. It was a time 
of great doubt and peril, such as comes but once in 
centuries. He postponed the demands of the national 
government until the loyal sentiment of the people 
should gain confidence and find its voice. Of all those 
who censure him, who would have done better ? Our 
sturdy old governor never for a single moment sympa- 
thized with treason in any form, or even doubted as to 
the plain path of duty. His was never the heart of a 
traitor. The best evidence of his fidelity may be found 
in the unwavering devotion of all his life. He had not a 
hope for himself, his children, his friends, or his country, 
that was not based upon the integrity and perpetuity 
of the Union. If it be true that the eye when glazino- 
in death is endowed with prophetic vision, I doubt not 
that his dying moments were cheered by the joyful 
prospect, soon to be revealed to us, of peace and happi- 
ness won by valor and restored by victory. 

His days are numbered. The whole of his career is 
before the world. Men may now pass judgment upon 
another fellow-mortal who has gone from earth. If we 
approach his bier and look down upon the mortal remains 
of Thomas Holliday Hicks, and then recount the whole 
story of his life and death, we must in justice say, 

"Nothing is here for tears, nothing to wail 
Or knock the breast ; no weakness, no contempt, 
Dispraise, or blame ; nothing but well and fair, 
And what may quiet us in a death so noble." 

fl. — • — _____ (Hi) 



m — — ^ p. 

36 OBITUARY ADDRESSES. 



Address of Mr. Smithers, of Delaware. 

Mr. Speaker : A good man has been gathered unto 
his fathers, and it is meet that I should lay upon his 
bier a simple testimonial of respect and gratitude. 

Though it may not be permitted me to call him great, 
yet if incorruptible integrity, unostentatious piety, and 
unwavering devotion to his country be worthy to be 
imitated or admired, then may it be truly said that 
Thomas Holliday Hicks has not hved in vain. Born 
with no accidental advantage of wealth, blessed with no 
culture of liberal education, he so demeaned himself in 
all the relations of life as to secure the affection and 
confidence of his fellow-men, who having committed 
to him the discharge of minor official duties, elevated 
him to the position of governor of Maryland; and in 
the darkest hour of the peril of the Republic he held 
in his hands the welfare of his native State. 

How well he executed his trust, how faithfully he 
administered his high office, the aj^preciation of the 
living manifests and the approval of posterity will attest. 
Had he yielded to the blandishments of base conspira- 
tors, had he blenched before the storm of indignation 
that assailed him, no human power could have averted 
from Maryland the miseries of civil strife. His fidelity 
baffled the designs of domestic traitors and checked the 
progress of rebellion; his temporizing policy held treason 
in suspense, and gave opportunity to the loyal north to 
rush to the succor of this threatened capital; and that 




we sit here to-day, in this council chamber of the nation, 
is due, perhaps, under the favor of the Almighty, to the 
faithfulness of him whom we mourn. Over the grave 
of such a man it is pardonable to linger with unwonted 
regret; but while we pay this tribute of honor to his 
memory, let us rest in confidence that history will record 
his virtues, and in assurance that, after a well-spent life, 
he has calmly passed to the enjoyment of a Christian 
immortality. 



Address of Mr. Kelley, of Pennsylvania. 

Mr. Speaker: It has, by their kindness, been my 
privilege to participate with some frequency in the 
protracted and sometimes intense struggle of the people 
of Maryland for the Union and freedom, and my State 
is largely indebted to the late Senator Thomas Holliday 
Hicks. It has therefore been thought fitting that I 
should add my humble word to what has been so 
appropriately said on this occasion. 

In my many visits to Maryland during this trying 
period I became somewhat familiar with Senator, or 
Governor Hicks, as he was when I first knew him. I 
found him ever frank and courteous to his peers, and 
kind, kind but without condescension, to the young, the 
poor, and the humble. His intercourse with all was 
easy and natural, and his manners were but the fit 
expression of his manly nature. This is well attested 
by the constancy with which honors attended him. He 



ai- 



g. 



38 OBITUARY ADDRESSES. 

whose death we mourn, dying as a senator of the United 
States, was once a constable, and doubtless proud of the 
confidence in him exhibited by his fellow-citizens in 
electing him to this humble office ; and from the day he 
entered upon its duties to the moment in which he 
breathed his last, and passed gladly to the bosom of 
his Maker, the badge of office attested how fully he 
enjoyed the confidence, the increasing confidence, of the 
people among whom he lived. It has been said, and I 
apprehend with perfect truth, that during this long career 
no man ever doubted his integrity. 

It seemed to me, sir, as I listened to the rapid sketch 
of his biography, that he was a chosen instrument in 
the hands of Providence for our good. The Almighty 
sees the end from the beginning. It is not so with 
men ; and the wealthy, the powerful, the arrogant, and 
the aristocratic land and slave owners among whom 
this poor child was born did not foresee, when they 
gave him their confidence, and made him first constable, 
then sherifi", and then promoted him from stage to stage, 
that they were qualifying him to be the power to curb 
their aspirations and control the destiny of their descend- 
ants. They did not foresee that they were training in 
that honest farmer boy a man who, by his will, should 
contravene their ambitious purposes and determine 
whether the capital of the country should remain so, or 
become the capital of a foreign and despotic confed- 
eracy. Yet more potent than any hundreds of men was 
Governor Hicks in the decision of that question. 

It is said that he wavered about the time that that 
question was pending in nicest balance. No man will 



say that his loyalty yielded. The utmost that can be 
said is, that in a period of revolutionary excitement, 
when the armed men around him were all the foes of 
his cause, when those whom the people of his State had 
invested with power and indicated as his counsellors all 
entertained views different .from his, and when those 
who loved the Union came to him with multiplied and 
diverse counsels, his judgment was for a moment 
bewildered. His instincts, his purposes, were ever 
true and patriotic. His caution, his courage, his will, 
his devotion to the cause, saved Maryland to the Union, 
in the crisis, and so secured the inauguration of the 
President of the country in its capital, and enabled the 
North to maintain him there without interval. In doing 
this he saved Maryland, Delaware, and southeastern 
Pennsylvania from becoming the Belgium of this terrible 
war; and his name will be dear to the future people of 
Pennsylvania and of Delaware, as it is to-day to those 
of his native State. 

I shall not attempt a sketch of his biography. I shall 
utter no formal words of eulogy. His life, his character, 
his deeds, are among the richest treasures of his native 
State. Let them be faithfully told. History has been 
to me through life valuable only as it gave me an insight 
into the characters and motives of its actors. Let Mary- 
land tell with pride the story of Thomas Holliday 
Hicks. Let her speak of his humble origin. Let her 
say that slavery denied him the advantages even of the 
cheap country school. And let her show how, in spite 
of all the curses inflicted on man by that institution, he 
became what he was; and she will not only illustrate the 

ii i 



IP m 

40 OBITUAEY ADDRESSES. 

beneficence of our republican institutions, but gladden 
the heart of many a poor father and mother and quicken 
the pulse and embolden the spirit of the poor and aspiring 
boy through countless generations. Thomas Holliday 
Hicks was a poor farmer's boy. He entered on his 
official career a constable. He died a senator ; and a 
grateful nation mourns his death. I apprehend that 
rhetoric can add no force, and eulogy no power, to these 
brief words. 



The question was taken, and the resolutions were 
unanimously adopted. 



m- 



Sermon of the Rev. B. II. Nadai,, of the Methodist Episcopal 

Church. 

And the King said unto his servants, Know ye not that there is a prince and 
a great man fallen this day in Israel? — 2 Samuel, iii, 38. 

Thomas Holliday Hicks, recently governor of Maryland, and 
more recently a Senator of the United States, is no more. His 
earthly race of nearly threescore years and ten has come to an 
almost sudden end. The news of this sad event has, by this time, 
reached nearly every corner of the loyal States, and has carried 
sorrow to every loyal heart. But most of all will the grief of this 
event fall upon Maryland. Her heart will bleed, from the lowest 
point of her soil that touches the Chesapeake to the very peaks of 
the Alleghanies; and the iiastern and Western Shores shall inter- 
change sorrowful greetings across the inland sea that divides them. 
The wealthy merchant, the cultured professional man, the retired 
scholar, and especially ohe sturdy yeoman, from whose class 
Governor Hicks sprung, will drop a tear, and utter words of 
fervent eulogy at the announcement of his death. 

We have read as our text, "A prince and a great man has fallen 
in Israel." Does any one doubt its appropriateness? We readily 
concede that Mr. Hicks was not born to greatness. No family 
made him; no college professors chiselled and moulded into form 
and polished into beauty and grace his youthful mind. Like the 
present Chief Magistrate of the country, he was born to rude 
fortunes. He inherited only the brawny soul and body with which 
to win his way in the coming struggle of life. When a poor man 
refuses to remain in the lot to which he is born, and by the force of 
his character comes to stand among the princes of the earth, and 
in his lofty position plays his part honorably, he is great. Thus 
was it with Governor Hicks. He was the son of a plain farmer on 
the Eastern Shore of Maryland. He had a common country school 
education, which in his day consisted wholly in reading, writing, 
and arithmetic, with a little geography, and no grammar. His 
occupation until he became a man was to work the farm on which 



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42 OBITUARY ADDRESSES. 



he was reared. He was not a genius. He did not achieve position 
and greatness by a single leap. From the fresh furrow to the seat 
of the governor, and to the chair of a United States senator, he 
took the graded path. He began in the a, b, c of office. From the 
humble position of constable, with growing influence, he proceeded 
to that of sheriff; thence to a place in the governor's council; next 
he was register of wills for his native county. In this position his 
reputation attained a breadth equal to that of the State, and after a 
long process of growth in public esteem and confidence, he was 
elected governor, and finally, as the just reward of services to 
which no price is equal, he became a member of the upper house 
of Congi'ess ; and to-day, in the presence of this august assemblage 
of the nation's chief men, in this hall of highest legislative dignity, 
with all the solemn pomp of a nation's grief, we pay homage to the 
man whose inheritance was poverty, whose only school-house was a 
cabin, and whose first office was that of constable. Only in our 
own nation, among all the peoples of the earth, could such a thing 
occur. The life of Governor Hicks, out of the midst of these 
obsequies, speaks to every poor boy in the land of the noble 
possibilities of service and renown which may yet crown an in- 
dustrious, honest, and patriotic life. It shows to men of the Old 
World that, while our youthful nation holds sacred law and order, 
it yet allows the freest play to individual enterprise ; that it furnishes 
soil and atmosphere and market for every atom of talent springing 
up under whatever shade of obscurity. 

Those who knew our deceased friend best; those who were his 
neighbors and life- long friends, unite in testifying most lovingly to 
the excellence of his character, both in his private and public 
relations. Kind to all, reaching out a hand of sympathy, especially 
to the poor, dealing justly with every one, and mercifully with the 
needy, he drew men to him and held them as by hooks of steel. 

There was in him the rare union of a strength which was rather 
moral than intellectural, with a most winning gentleness. We have 
been informed, on the best authority, that while he was register of 
wills for his native county, a period of twenty years, or thereabouts, 
he managed the business of his office with such steady justice, with- 
such complete knowledge of the law, with such tender consideration 



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for the interests of widows and orphans, as to establish a reputation 
for complete honesty, firmness, and gentleness, thus mixing in one 
character, and in one reputation, the most opposite virtues. 

When such a man refuses one a favor, the pain is the least 
possible and when he does a favor, the manner of it, the spirit of 
it, binds the favored party to him by the very heart-chords. It was 
our privilege to see the devotion of Governor Hicks's personal friends 
at his bed-side, in the sickness which ended his life. With what 
solicitude, as of sous in the absence of a son, they watched; with 
what tender voices and eyes they spoke and looked ; how they wept 
in the depth and reality of their grief! These, my friends, were 
people whose hearts the dying veteran had won by long years of 
intercourse or by acts of disinterested kindness. 

Indeed, it is difficult to imagine how a plain man like Thomas 
HoLLiDAY Hicks could have attained his eminent position in the 
world without just such traits as these. He had to impress men, 
not by resolving to do it, not by dazzling parts, but by the weight 
and excellence of his manhood. Happy is the man whose character, 
whose inmost and sole self, is his best talent; whose life, inner and 
outer, carries him, as it were, naturally, into the very hearts of his 
fellow-men. Such a man need not and will not trim his sails to 
meet the varying breath of popular applause ; but, being in himself 
the type of all honest men, can aiford to walk without looking 
behind him. And when the hour comes to die, standing up among 
his people, he can say with the ancient seer of Israel : "And now, 
behold, I am old and gray-headed; and behold, my sons are with 
you, and I have walked before you from my childhood unto this 
day. Behold, here I am; witness against me before the Lord, and 
before His anointed, whose ox have I taken, or whose ass have I 
taken, or whom have I oppressed, whom have I defrauded, or at 
whose hands have I received any bribe to blind mine eyes therewith, 
and I will restore it you." 

In the pride and strength of life, especially of young life, we 
prefer to prevail by eloquence, by superior learning, or skill, or by 
some form of mental force. We wish to have ourselves to thank 
for our own success. Like Nebuchadnezzar, we would build our 
empire with the might of our own wisdom and the strength of our 



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44 OBITUARY ADDRESSES. 



own hand ; but when age and just views sober us, by shoeing us 
the littleness of the creature's force, and especially when death begins 
to drop its dark curtain between us and the painted world, we are 
compelled to feel that it were bttter to succeed by the aid of 
character, and as the servants and stewards of God, than by the 
proudest and profoundest human art. Nay, when the death that 
comes to us is even not our own, but another's ; when the corpse lies 
in state at the end of a noble career, aye, or of an ignoble one ; 
when, in such an hour of sepulchral darkness, the light of heaven 
sifts through the tight-woven tissues of. our pride and ambition, we 
are made to feel the truth of the familiar couplet : 

A wit's a feather, and a chief's a rod, 

An honest man 's the noblest work of God. 

And at least, for the moment of disenchantment, we conclude it 
were nobler and better to succeed in life by what we are, than by 
the highest earthly skill, or eloquence, or learning. The man whose 
remains lie before us owed nothing to learning; he owed nothing 
to the eloquence which stirs men's blood, or tickles their ears. In 
spite of the want of these, by the native f jrce of sense, honesty, 
moderation, gentleness, and courage, he won men's hearts, subdued 
circumstances, achieved place, and did much, very much, towards 
controlling events. 

But to turn to the great epoch of Mr. Hicks's life, namely, the 
period of his special connexion with the history of the war : we 
have been strongly impressed with the wisdom and graciousness 
of Divine Providence in allowing his term of office to fall precisely 
where it did. Maryland has had governors under whose administra- 
tion the rebellion would have met no ill greeting. It would be 
painful to speculate as to what would have been the result had 
Providence allowed treason to culminate a few years earlier. In 
that case, we might have had in Maryland a governor who would 
have forgotten his oath of paramount allegiance to the Union, who 
would have called the legislature of the State together at the instance 
of secession commissioners from Alabama and Mississippi, who would 
have been a timid or even a ready tool under the persuasions or the 
threats of virtual traitors : and before the blow was struck at Fort 



ii- 




Sumter, the noble State might have been so committed to rebellion, 
and so completely interlaced with treason in the far south, that when 
the war came, she, and not Virginia, might have been the permanent 
battle-ground, the Golgotha of the rebellion. In that case her fields 
had now been bare, her acres fenceless, barnless, trampled, parched. 
Baltimore might have been at this hour a rebel stronghold. Jeff. 
Davis might have been at the White House, and the flag of treason 
might have been flaunted in the face of the Goddess of Liberty on 
the dome of this building. 

But, in the good providence of the God of our fathers, Maryland 
had a patriotic governor ; a man without the instincts of aristocracy ; 
a man of the people; a Unionist without an if ; a man who did not 
balance the life of the nation against the iniquitous institution of 
slavery — who did not divide up and parcel out his patriotism between 
the different States, but merged it and them, or, rather, built them 
with it into the glorious fabric of the Union. And for the demon 
of secession, with all its horrid solicitations, he had only the reply 
of an unfaltering and unalterable No ! It was " no" to the southern 
commissioners; "no" to traitorous domestic aristocrats; "no" to 
slavery; "no" to the members of the legislature; "no" to the 
bloody mob of the dreadful 19th of April; "no" ever, and "no" to 
the end. If, for one moment, he seemed to falter, it was only a 
seeming, under duress, that, like the great oak bent by the storm, 
he might live to present an unblanched front to every succeeding 
storm of treason. 

What a noble sentiment, and how nobly uttered, was his reply to 
a certain conspirator who visited Annapolis to induce him to issue 
an untimely call of the old disloyal legislature. To the whole list 
of his arguments the governor returned a firm denial. The next 
resort was a threat ; he was told that he had better consult his 
personal safety. "What ?" said Mr. Hicks, "do you mean to say 
my life is in danger if I refuse]" " Yes !" " Well," said the noble 
patriot, " if I had forty lives, I would lose them all rather than do 
an act against my convictions of right." Thus spoke, my brethren, 
not a Roman but a patriot's spirit, a Christian conscience, a soul 
firmly built on right. To that " No," persistently repeated until 
his native State is now free, Maryland owes a statue of marble or 




bronze, and another more enduring than metal or stone — one of 
perennial, blessed, grateful remembrance, and in the golden age now 
so brightly dawning upon her she will pay it. As one of her sons, 
I feel my own instincts to be the voice of prophesy. 

But for each individual human being there is a higher and more 
enduring relation than that to the State; we mean his relation to 
God, the final judge of all. Mr. Hicks became a professing 
Christian early in life, and, so far as we know, cherished his 
Christian convictions and maintained his Christian purity to the 
last. The testimony of those who knew him best represents him 
as pure and excellent in all the relations of life. On this 
point, however, I will confine myself to matters within my own 
knowledge. 

When Governor Hicks arrived in Washington, during the present 
session of Congress, I waited on him, and, after friendly conversa- 
tion, proposed to be his pastor during his stay among us. I under- 
stood him cordially to accept the proffer. I made several calls upon 
him before his sickness. On Saturday I learned that he had been 
stricken down with paralysis. I hastened to his room, where I 
foundhim most faithfully and affectionately attended by several of 
his personal friends. He was entirely speechless, but still clearly 
and keenly conscious. He recognized me at once, and, against my 
remonstrance, exerted himself to draw his right hand, which re- 
mained untouched by the paralysis, from under the bed-cover, for 
the customary greeting. I took a seat by his bed, and attempted 
to elicit his state of mind. His lips moved, but yielded only 
shapeless, inarticulate breath. I inquired whether he would have 
me pray. His lips again moved fruitlessly, but his look clearly 
answered " yes." The moment was deeply solemn ; all hearts were 
affected. The prayer ended; though pained at the thought of de- 
manding effort of any sort from him, I was still anxious to ascertain 
his state of mind, and said, " Governor, do you trust for salvation in 
our Lord Jesus Christ 1 If you do, lift your hand." In an instant 
his hand went up with energy. This touched and animated all 
present. My position at the side of the dying man now became 
pleasant. He was evidently waiting for the consolations of religious 



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HON. T. H. HICKS. 47 



converse. I quoted numerous passages of Scripture; I recited 
several hymns, particularly the one commencing 



Jesus, tby blood and righteousness 
My beauty are, my glorious dress ; 

and that other, beginning 

There is a fountain filled with blood, 
Drawn from Immanuel's veins ; 

and, finally, that noble gospel lyric of Charles Wesley, opening 
with the stanza — 

Jesus, lover of my soul, 

Let me to thy bosom fly. 
While the nearer waters roll, 

While the tempest still is high ; 
Hide me, oh, my Saviour, hide, 

'Till the storm of life is past ; 
Safe into the haven guide, 

Oh, receive my soul at last. 

These were the hymns in which, for years, he had been wont to 
express his faith in the blessed Saviour's atonement. As he listened, 
his face was overspread and made luminous by a smile ; then through 
the sunshine came the grateful, happy tears, and his great frame, in 
spite of the living death of paralysis, quivered and shook with 
emotion. This was a scene to be long remembered by all who were 
present. Our patriot and Christian brother stood on the confines 
of eternity, about to enter the world of blessed spirits, and had 
paused to let us know how the way looked before him. "We all 
wept. 

On another occasion, while talking with him, I said : " Governor, 
you have borne an important part in the public service of the 
country, and the nation is grateful to you ; it will remember you ; 
but you no doubt feel that even suck services are nothing for a poor 
sinner to rely on in approaching his God. Your trust is in the 
mercy of God in Christ Jesus, is it not ?" And he again answered 
with his uplifted hand. 

On Sunday morning, about ten o'clock, I was again with him. 



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48 OBITUARY ADDRESSES. 



and asked him: "Shall we join in prayer, this Sabbath morning, 
at your bedside?" Again he lifted bis hand, and gazed reverently 
up toward heaven. 

On Sunday night, about ten o'clock, I was with him for the last 
time. His friends who had remained at his bedside during the day 
now supposed his consciousness to be gone. But they were mistaken. 
He recognized me immediately. "Governor," I said, "if you rest 
upon Christ as your Saviour, raise your hand." It was done 
instantly. Again, " If you feel assured that He will receive you to 
himself when you pass away, lift your hand." The hand was 
lifted once more, and waved back and forth as if in holy triumph. 
In half an hour from that time be became unconscious, and the 
next morning Thomas Holliday Hicks passed into history, and, 
as we fully trust and believe, into the house not made with hands, 
eternal in the heavens. 

We end where we began, and repeat, that a prince and a great 
man has fallen in Israel — a great man grown up and out from the 
level of the people — great without the aid of adventitious circum- 
stances — great upon the basis of moral character — great by being 
equal to the great emergencies of a great historic period — great, not 
because a great occasion made him so, but because his simple, 
truthful, honest, noble, incorruptible nature eminently fitted him to 
accept the occasion when it came, and to wield it with a strong and 
decided hand. 

But finally, let us pause and stand in awe before God's messenger, 
death. In the presence of that coffin " only God is great." 



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